PLATE FROM THE "SERVICE DES LILIACÉES"

Creator(s): Sèvres Porcelain Manufactory (Manufacturer)

Currently in storage

About this object

This plate is decorated with a bright pink flower identified in the border as "Velthimia glauque," or Western Cape Sand Lily. The end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth century saw ongoing research into botanical specimans resulting in beautifully printed folios of exotic flowers. The well-known botanical illustrator Pierre Joseph Redouté's celebrated work, "Les Liliacées," 1802-16, is the source for the species depicted on this service, which was made by the Sèvres factory for King Louis XVIII. This is the only plate known to date to exist from the service, much of which was likely destroyed when the Tuileries Palace was looted during the July Revolution of 1830.

The plate is decorated in its center with a bright pink flower identified in the border as "Veltheimia Glauque" (Western Cape Sand Lily). The border ornamentation consists of groups of two liliaceous plants linked with a convolvulus in brown heightened with gold and set against a pale blue ground.

Object name:

PLATE FROM THE "SERVICE DES LILIACÉES"

Made from:

Hard paste porcelain

Made in:

Sèvres, France

Date made:

1821

Size:

4.4 × 23.8 cm (1 3/4 × 9 3/8 in.)

Detailed information for this item

Catalog number:

24.246

Signature marks:

Marks Printed on back; crossed L's with a fleur de lis and 21 for Louis XVIII's reign

Credit line:

Museum Purchase, 2006